Pub facing demolition was important wartime haunt
Recently announced plans for a refurbishment of the area around Maidstone East Station will see the demolition of the Victoria pub.
The building is in such a sorry state today that probably few will mourn its passing, but it was not always thus.
The Victoria or the Vic as it was last known before it closed in 2011 started life as the Victoria Hotel, at the time second only in size to the Royal Star in Maidstone. Its position alongside the railway made it the ideal stop for travellers.
Rosemary Harlow, from Mallings Drive in Bearsted, whose late husband Norman Harlow grew up in the pub during the Second World War, said it seemed to have been a place of some significance – and even intrigue.
The landlord at the time was Dave Harlow, Norman’s father, who moved from a pub called the Ruby Lounge in Margate – closed when the coast was sealed up because of fears of invasion – to the Victoria in 1939. He stayed there until 1949, moving back to Margate for a while before eventually returning to take over the Maidstone Masonic Hall, then in Tonbridge Road.
The landlord was himself a freemason. Described by Mrs Harlow as a small man, who nevertheless suffered no nonsense and was capable of being very severe, Dave Harlow had seen his own war service during the Great War, signing on at 17, and serving in the Dardanelles until invalided home with malaria.
Perhaps, his own experiences made him sympathetic to servicemen, but airman returning to their base at West Malling would always make sure they stopped off at the Victoria en route where they knew they would be made welcome. Mr Harlow was married to Bertha (nee Coleman). As a child, Norman Harlow’s bedroom overlooked the railway line. He had a lucky escape one day when a German bomb fell into a coal truck on the nearby sidings, which fortunately contained much of the blast.
Norman was convinced his father’s pub was an important place during the war. He recalls the chief of police and the head of the fire service coming to secret meetings with other bigwigs, while he was told to go and play elsewhere.
The pub’s main clientele were soldiers from the nearby barracks and lawyers from the county law courts.
Young Norman recalled one mysterious female guest at the hotel who would dress all in black and seemed too keen on asking the military customers about their orders. His father reported her to the police as a possible spy and she disappeared.
Dave Harlow died in 1983, aged 86. He was then living at Lenham. Norman Harlow died in July last year.